The National Basketball Players Association has weighed in on the disagreement between Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks about whether the star forward should be shut down for the rest of the 2025/26 season, according to Shams Charania of ESPN (Twitter link).
Reporting last week indicated that the Bucks wanted to hold out their franchise player for the next few weeks after an injury-plagued season in which he battled knee, groin, ankle, and calf issues. Antetokounmpo, however, was said to be pushing to return to action once he recovered from his left knee hyperextension and bone bruise, despite the fact that Milwaukee has fallen out of postseason contention.
The NBPA issued a statement on Tuesday that both supported Antetokounmpo and questioned whether the NBA is committed to enforcing its player participation policy.
“The Player Participation Policy was designed by the league to hold teams accountable and ensure that when an All-Star like Giannis Antetokounmpo is healthy and ready to play, he is on the court,” the statement reads. “Unfortunately, anti-tanking policies are only as effective as their enforcement; fans, broadcast partner, and the integrity of the game itself will continue to suffer as long as ownership goes unchecked. We look forward to collaborating with the NBA on meaningful new proposals that will directly address and discourage tanking.”
The NBA’s player participation policy specifically addresses a situation like this one. A team is considered to be in violation of the policy if it shuts down a healthy “star” for an extended period. The rule is designed to avoid scenarios in which tanking teams sit their best players in order to improve their draft position.
Of course, whether a player qualifies as healthy isn’t necessarily a black and white issue. It’s certainly not uncommon for players to play through minor ailments over the course of the 82-game season, and multiple medical experts may have differing opinions on whether or not a player has fully recovered from a given injury.
We still have nearly three weeks left in the regular season, so if Antetokounmpo feels as if he’s ready to return to action at some point during that window, we’ll see if the Bucks relent and activate him.
The fact that the players’ union expressed a willingness to collaborate with the league on anti-tanking measures is also noteworthy, since commissioner Adam Silver has stated in no uncertain terms that the NBA intends to implement new rules on that front ahead of the 2026/27 season.
Bucks are such a poverty franchise with no real direction. Trade me and Giannis!
Giannis is not Innocent either. They are both at fault and I feel bad for anyone who gets him. If he gets a super max that team will not win.
Poverty teams haven’t won rings this decade.
So NBPA is complaining about players putting their health at risk by forcing themselves to play through injury for awards, but players like Giannis also need to come back immediately? What, did they hire Tony Clark over the weekend?
You are the ones who agreed to these rules. Blame yourself as much as the league.
Giannis wants to play when he’s healthy. That has nothing to do with the 65 game rule.
And the NBPA wants the league to step in and determine if he’s healthy enough to play, essentially overriding the team in the process? Not a good precedent to set. Wasn’t too long ago that Jazz fans were rightfully pissed off at the league for attempting to do the same thing, albeit with respect to tanking.
As much as I understand Giannis wanting to play, the Bucks have ample motivation to shut him down. Multiple lower body injuries, possible (or more likely probable) trade in the offseason, nothing to play for at this point, and he would only be coming back for a few games anyway. I think shutting him down is very reasonable given those circumstances and the vast majority of teams would do the same in their position. NBPA coming out with a statement about this situation but not a myriad of other ones which could’ve/should’ve warranted one doesn’t give them a leg to stand on here.
TL;DR: I have a crazy on how the league could implement relegation to combat tanking.
Hearing about the Euro-league futbol structure of relegating the worst teams to the minor leagues, I was thinking about the comparison to the NBA. Of course the NBA does not have a minor league, it has a development league, which is a very different thing. The level of competition isn’t just a step up to the big leagues, it’s a world of difference.
But as the ultimate anti-tanking motivator, what if the worst 2 teams could be “sent down to the G-league” for a year for their rebuild? How could that possibly work?
Since expanding the league by 2 teams sounds like it’s a done deal, if they start this at the same time as expansion they would still have 30 teams active on the schedule, with 2 teams in the G-league.
Every year, 2 NBA teams would be assigned to the G-league. And the 2 teams previously in the G-league would return to the NBA. The 2 teams sent down would automatically get the 3rd and 4th picks. The two teams coming up would get the 1st and 2nd picks, determined by which of them wins the separate 7 game series they play against each other while the rest of the G-league has their normal playoff.
The 2 teams could be the worst in each conference. Or there could be a process of applying to be a relegated team, if a team knows they have to rebuild. More on that below.
Even though the G-league season has a completely different structure, the two NBA teams can be integrated into it with some creativity. I had to read up on how the G-league works.
They start the season with a 14 game tournament, that wraps up just before Christmas. Then they start over with a 36 game regular season, which finishes with an eight team, three round, single elimination playoff. That’s 50 games, plus playoffs. The tricky part is the overlap of the two halves.
For the 14 game tournament, they split the league into 4 divisions for round robin play, and the leader of each division plus the next best 4 teams qualify for an eight team playoff. The overlap occurs because the playoff represents the first two games of the regular season, similar to the NBA Cup. And similar to the Cup, the first two rounds count, but the tournament championship game does not. And every team plays 2 games during the same time, so after the tournament championship completes they are 2 games into the regular season.
Those 2 games all happen at a single event for all 31 teams (there is a Mexico City team that only plays road games) where the NBA GMs show up to evaluate talent just before trade season heats up.
To fit 2 NBA teams into that structure, we need to consider two things. First, the competition level is unfair. And second, the priorities are different. The NBA teams are there exclusively to prepare for their return to the big league.
To address the competition level, the NBA teams would be on a separate track from the rest. They would not compete for the 14 game tournament championship or the end-of-season championship. They would count their record across both halves of the season, only to compare to each other for home court in the seven game series they play against each other at the end of the season.
They would also need to schedule every G-league team to have an equal number of games against NBA opponents, since those games would count for their own record. That also plays into the need to prepare for the return to the NBA.
The G-league schedule of 50 games isn’t enough to keep an NBA team in shape. The NBA teams will need to get closer to an 82 game season. The G-league doesn’t play as tight a schedule as the NBA, but they would still need to extend the season a little and add a few games to make room. Currently they wrap up their playoff before the end of the NBA regular season, so they could push that a little. If they add 3 games, that would account for 2 games against one NBA team, and 1 game against the other.
Each NBA team would also play half the league (2 of the 4 divisions) during the 14 game tournament. They would play the same half of the league once during the regular season, and the other half of the teams twice during the regular season. Between both the tournament and regular season they will play every team twice. And 45 or 46 of those games—maybe 47 or 48 after the expansion teams add affiliate teams—would be in the regular season. So while the G-league teams play a 39 game regular season, the NBA teams would have to play a more compressed schedule.
That would still only total a 62 to 66 game season (after expansion affiliates), so they would want to squeeze a few games in between the two NBA teams, scattered throughout the season. If they get the total game count into the mid 70s, then a 7 game series between them gets them very close to an 82 game season.
Although they would be playing a compressed schedule—probably a back-to-back every week—they could rest stars and go deep into the bench like it was pre-season, and probably still win almost every game. (I’m assuming they will all get caught sleeping occasionally. Who will be the first NBA team to lose a G-league game?)
The team with the better record over the combined season gets home court advantage for the series, and the winner of the series gets the #1 draft pick on the way back up to the NBA. For the teams on the way down, determining who gets #3 and who gets #4 could be anything from a coin flip to any criteria about their records.
With the 1 through 4 picks accounted for, the 5 through 12 picks are all lotto selected from the remaining 8 teams that miss the play-in. The 4 teams that lose the play-in get the next 4, then the playoff teams after that. This would eliminate most of the motivation to lose play-in game to get a shot at a lottery pick.
They would still be an NBA team, subject to the CBA, able to make trades and sign free agents.
This would obviously be a huge financial hit to any team relegated. They would still be paying NBA salaries without any national TV—although having the top picks might get them something. Especially if they finish the season with a playoff between the two of them. The league has various revenue sharing methods, but it would still be a big hit. Those teams might have to offer some compensation to their season ticket holders. But hey, at least their fans would get to watch their team win some games for a change!
On the flip side, it would likely increase G-league revenues substantially. Not only would G-league cities get a couple visits per year from an NBA team, it would be the teams with top draft picks. Plus it would improve the value of the G-league for developing players to get a few games against NBA competition.
For the NBA team, they could work out their bench to a level never seen in the pre-season. They would get back into habits of winning. And their #3 or #4 draft pick would get a year to develop without the pressure.
By putting the 1 and 2 picks and the end of the rebuild year, it would be difficult for teams to gauge the draft class a year out. In years where there is an apparent Wemby-level player a year away the draft, there might be multiple teams that would be willing apply to take the hit, and frankly, suffer the humiliation of being “sent down”, just to have a chance at them, and hope they still look that good a year later.
I would think if two relegated teams are playing a series for a shot at a Wemby, that would be good TV.
If multiple teams from one conference apply to be sent down, they will need a method to determine who gets it. And if no team in a conference volunteers then the worst team in the conference gets sent down. There’s a million possibilities on the details.
I like your username.
For what it’s worth, I have a lot simpler idea to eliminate tanking that would be 100% effective.
If you still own your draft pick the year of the draft, and the pick ends up in the lottery, it goes to the end of the lottery. That’s it. No more reason to tank.
I sincerely hope this is AI trolling
(Not to be confused with AL trolling)
?
E for effort, but I doubt the owners would agree to this in the first place. Two NBA teams being sent down and losing a lot of revenue in the process? Seems like a non-starter.
Oh I completely agree, even less likely than reducing the number of games. I was just having fun with the thought.
An no, Real 2k, not AI, that’s a real example of the rabbit holes my brain goes down.
Congratulations on a time consuming and thoughtful note .. a VERY thoughtful note.
Oh my god with the f’ing tanking stuff. Nobody has ever complained about teams “tanking” once they’ve been mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. The reason this was a problem this year is because 1/3 of the league was blatantly taking on January 1st. The Bucks have 11 games left. Give me a break.
I love John Hollinger’s idea to kill tanking: the draft-pick draft.
Current reverse standings are IND, WAS, BRK, SAC. Let’s say that holds. On what would otherwise be lottery day, instead IND starts on the clock. They choose the team they expect to finish last next season. They cannot pick themselves. Say they pick SAC, always a safe choice. Then they’ll spend next season rooting against the Kings, because their 2027 pick will be 1st if the Kings finish last, 2nd if they finish second-to-last, etc. Next up, WAS can pick anyone but themselves or SAC, and so on.
This will generally accomplish the goal of losing teams getting high draft picks, albeit a year removed, But the beefs would be to die for: by the time NYK is on the clock, only a few teams would be left, so do they pick OKC or SAS, or do they risk antagonizing rival BOS? Oh, the pettiness…
Yep, that’s the same concept as my idea, but adding specific rules for how to swap picks.
(And I didn’t come up with this idea, it’s been floated before.)